Griz continue indoor season at Mountain States Games
1/29/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Indoor Track, Men's Track and Field, Women's Track and Field
Montana Performance List || Big Sky Performance List
The Montana track and field teams will continue their indoor season this week when the Grizzlies compete at the Mountain States Games at Pocatello, Idaho. The two-day meet starts Friday and continues through Saturday afternoon. The meet will be held at Idaho State's Holt Arena.
Track events Friday evening include the preliminaries of the 60 meters, 60-meter hurdles and 200 meters, the 5,000 meters and the distance medley relay.
Field events taking place Friday will be the men's long jump, pole vault and weight throw and the women's long jump, high jump and shot put.
Everything else will be contested Saturday.
After back-to-back trips to Montana State to open the season, with meets that start and finish in one evening and mostly follow the same schedule, the Grizzlies will get a taste of something new this weekend.
"It's a different venue with different athletes and a different schedule with different times of the day for the events than we're used to, so there are a lot of good things about this meet," said UM coach Brian Schweyen.
Montana struggled in its opener at MSU two weeks ago, then had better performances last Friday night at Brick Breeden Fieldhouse. There was one school record and seven event winners.
"Practices are going well, our confidence is starting to come along, and workouts are getting better, so I anticipate a good meet this week," said Schweyen.
"It's a meet where we want to go and be better than we've been all year. We want more school records and lifetime bests and to be better than we were last week. We've got two meets under our belt, so we've got no excuses for not being ready to compete."
The Hot List
* Junior Sammy Evans, the 2014 Big Sky Conference indoor and outdoor triple jump champion, went 40-7.75 to win the event Friday at MSU. That broke the indoor school record of 40-2.75, set by Kellee Glaus in 2013.
Evans' mark tops the Big Sky performance list. Only she and Eastern Washington freshman Morena Mannucci, who has a season best of 39-2.25, have jumped over 38 feet this winter.
* Evans also ranks third in the long jump with her effort of 18-7.25 at Eastern Washington in early December and fourth in the high jump at 5-5.75 from the same meet.
* Junior newcomer Nicole Anskaitis, of Geelong, Australia, didn't waste any time making a splash in her debut meet for the Grizzlies. She went 12-9.5 in the pole vault Friday, a mark that ranks second in the Big Sky behind Eastern Washington sophomore Courtney Bray (12-11.5).
Montana has never had a Big Sky Conference indoor pole vault champion.
Anskaitis also ran an adjusted 8.89 to place second in the 60-meter hurdles. That time ranks ninth in the Big Sky.
* Junior Stephanie Wells (42-5.5), sophomore Allie Keleti (41-2.25) and sophomore Carlie Jessop (39-1) all had career bests in the shot put Friday, as did redshirt junior Anna Pershouse (54-1) while winning the weight throw.
* Freshman Erika McLeod has gone 17-8 and 17-10.75 in the long jump the first two meets of 2015. Expect her to be over 18 feet by Friday night and close to 19 feet by next month.
* Sophomore Dominique Bobo won both of the 200-meter races at Montana State to open the season. He ran an adjusted 22.07 on Jan. 16 and a 22.09 last Friday. The former time ranks fifth in the Big Sky.
* Senior Jacob Leininger is one of four athletes in the Big Sky who has hit the qualifying time in the 60-meter hurdles. Leininger went an adjusted 8.30 on Friday. He trails Sacramento State's Paul Lyons (7.99) and Northern Arizona's Vernon Jamison (8.00) and Deante Kemper (8.14) on the Big Sky list.
* Junior Dylan Reynolds cracked the top 10 in the Big Sky in the 400 meters with his adjusted time of 49.36 Friday, as did senior Ben Williamson in the mile, with his adjusted time of 4:14.90.
* Montana's 4x400-meter relay time of 3:18.82 last Friday ranks third in the Big Sky behind Northern Colorado (3:16.50) and Montana State (3:18.71).
* Freshman Pierce Frazier is tied for seventh in the Big Sky in the pole vault at 15-9, which he cleared at the opening Montana State meet. Six athletes have gone more than 16 feet but none more than 16-2.75.
* Sophomore Nick Jackson ranks fifth in the Big Sky in the shot put with his mark of 51-7 from Eastern Washington in early December. Senior Brian Maus ranks eighth in the weight with his throw of 54-2.5 at the same meet.
* The top five times in the Big Sky in the women's 800 meters all came on Friday at Montana State. Sophomore Reagan Colyer, who won the event at the Big Sky indoor championships last winter, ranks third with her adjusted time of 2:13.51. The other athletes in the top five are from Idaho State and Montana State.
* Senior Keli Dennehy (4:58.72) and Colyer (4:59.15) rank third and fourth in the mile, Dennehy (9:48.13) ranks second in the 3,000 meters.
* Sophomore Nicole Stroot's career-best pentathlon score of 3,430 from Montana State earlier this month continues to rank third in the Big Sky behind MSU senior Carley McCutchen (3,761) and Bobcat junior Danielle Muri (3,687).
Players Mentioned
